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by MARK
MARK

5 Reasons Why You Aren’t

Getting German Cases
Right
Want to fit right in with native German speakers?

Then you’re going to have to start getting

your German cases right.

If your articles don’t properly match their cases,

you’ll stick out like a sore thumb.

It doesn’t matter if your German is perfect

otherwise.

How could your overall Germany fluency hinge on

one tiny word?

It may seem nitpicky, but getting German

cases right can make or break your fluency.

Don’t worry, we’re building a strong legal case

against the German language for all the pain and
suffering it has caused language learners.

In the meantime, you have no choice but to start

sucking a little bit less at getting German cases
right.

We all sucked at this when we started. Then, we

discovered that German cases could be totally
mastered (and easily remembered during
conversation) once we recognized the major
reasons why we sucked.

Believe it or not, mastering German cases is no

harder than perfecting your pronunciation, cracking
the code of German word order or learning how to
understand crazy German compound nouns. It’s all
part of familiarizing yourself with your acquired
language.

No shortcuts necessary! Soon, you’ll be getting

perfect German sentences together as smoothly as
the characters in your favorite German movies and
your YouTube-based German instructors.

Before we go into some simple tactics for

improving your German case skills, take a look at
the cold, hard evidence we’ve got that German
cases are meant to inflict pain on language
learners.

Download: This blog post is available as a

convenient and portable PDF that you can take
anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

Why’s It So Hard to Get German

Cases Right?

Just look over the following two article charts, and

tell me if you can spot any major differences:

German

Masc. Fem. Neut. Plural

Nom . der die das die
Acc . den die das die
Dat . dem der dem den
Gen . des der des der
English

Masc. Fem. Neut. Plural

Nom. The The The The
Acc. The The The The
Dat. The The The The
Gen. The The The The

Pretty frustrating, right?

In English, you always know where you stand with

your articles. Regardless of gender, quantity or
who’s doing what action, “the” will always be “the.”
German is far more specific.

While these details have the advantage of making

German a more precise language, they can also be
intimidating when you begin learning the language.
It becomes immediately apparent if you don’t know
what to do here.

Being unable to get the case right is something that

prevents people from being able to pass German
tests in their German class, or to receive
certifications like TestDAF (the cheapest and most
common certification allowing foreign students to
study in Germany) or the Goethe-Institut Großes
Deutsches Sprachdiplom (the most prestigious
German as a Foreign Language certification).

However, now you know exactly what you’re up

against. Knowing which case a certain noun should
be in is much easier than remembering that noun’s
gender. The cases follow a set of fairly consistent
rules that you can learn pretty quickly, and you only
need a few easy-to-follow guidelines which can
help you to remember the gender of nouns.
5 Reasons Why You Aren’t Getting
German Cases Right

There are only FIVE important concepts you need

to master to always identify the correct case in
German:

•when nominative isn’t always straightforward

•how to tell the difference between direct and

indirect objects

•how to use the genitive

•which verbs are always dative

•how the most common 30 prepositions are

divided into four groups

How many of these can you check off the list as

things you already know? Unsurprisingly, each of
these concepts corresponds to one reason why
you aren’t always getting German cases right. One
by one, we’re going to tackle these and get you on
your way to German fluency. If you feel you need to
learn more generally about cases before honing in
on these specific details, review this previous post
on nominative and accusative cases for a more in-
depth lesson.

1. The nominative case isn’t always

straightforward.

The nominative case is the subject of the sentence.

That is, the person or thing which is doing the
action in the sentence. Though that sounds simple
enough, here are some examples of sentences
where it’s not immediately obvious what’s going on:

Double nominative

One thing that might trip you up on a test is that,

generally, if the sentence only uses some form of
the verb sein (to be), then both nouns in the
sentence are in the nominative case. It makes
sense if you think about it, because the sentence
doesn’t actually have an object – it just has the
same subject twice.

Die neue Schülerin war eine Französin aus dem

Süden.

Das Praktikum war die beste Erfahrung meines

Lebens.

However, keep in mind that, as with any rule, there

are exceptions and this is not always the case 100%
of the time.

Sentences without nominative

One of the first things that learners of German

should learn not to say is ich bin kalt . Rather than
meaning that the room temperature isn’t
comfortable for you, this means that your body is
cold and is something you might hear during an
episode of Tatort (the German CSI) when they find a
dead body.

The proper German way to express discomfort

when the window is open is mir ist kalt . This
sentence is unusual because it only has one noun
in the dative case. I think you can imagine the
rather indirect relationship between you and the
cold – by putting the noun in the dative case, it
shows that the environment is cold for you, rather
than just you being cold.

There are also some verbs where what might seem

to be the subject is instead in the dative case:

Eigentlich gefällt es mir

mir, früh aufzustehen.

2. You need to know the difference

between direct and indirect objects.

This is some real grade school level stuff here, and

it won’t take long to pick this up naturally after a
while. Throughout the rest of the post we’ll explore
the ways in which direct and indirect objects are
defined and used in the German language. For
now, I’m going to provide you with a clear, simple
way to tell them apart:

Direct object – An object which directly receives

the effect of an action and is the primary object.

Example: “Please write the essay.” The essay is the

direct object in this sample sentence.

Indirect object – An object which is passively

affected by an action and is not the primary object.

Example: “Tell him the news.” News is the direct

object because it is being told, while him is the
indirect object because he is not performing an
action, he is passively being informed and the news
could be told to anyone else.

3. You have to learn which verbs are

always dative.

Accusative or Dative?

Accusative case is the object of the sentence, and

dative is the indirect object of the sentence. In
sentences that have both a direct object and an
indirect object, it’s usually pretty clear which noun
has a more direct relationship to the verb:

Ich hab ihm das Geschenk gegeben.

Dat. Acc.

Er hat mir leider stundenlang die Photos von

seiner Reise nach Thailand gezeigt.
Dat. Acc.

Here, the photos and the gift are being directly

“given” or “shown,” while the person they are being
given or shown to is the indirect object
object.

If someone says something to you, it’s always

dative
dative.

Ich sagte dir

dir, dass du dir etwas warmes anziehen
solltest.

Sie hat mir gar nicht gesagt, dass sie nur

veganisches Essen isst.

You will also find that certain verbs are always

dative
dative.

danken fehlen folgen gefallen gehören

glauben helfen passieren erlauben bleiben

Kannst du mir helfen?

Dieses blaue Auto folgte mir den ganzen Tag.

Ich muss dir für deine Hilfe mit meiner

Autoreparatur danken.

When you learn a new verb, you actually need to

know a few things in order to use it correctly. Is it
reflexive? What prepositions does it use? And is it
dative or accusative
accusative? Make a note every time
you learn a new verb about whether the verb is
dative or accusative, and even try to find a good,
memorable sample sentence that you can refer to
when you’re not sure.

4. The genitive case is worth knowing, but

is often neglected.

Genitive is considered a fancy grammatical remnant

that’s more trouble than it’s worth. When it comes
up in class, some students announce that they hate
it and want nothing to do with it. Certain dialects of
German have already done away with the genitive,
which inspired the title of a recent popular book
about grammar: Der Dativ ist dem Genitiv sein Tod.

I personally think the genitive sounds nice and you

actually see it pretty often, so you might as well try
to figure it out.

Basically, the genitive adds possession

possession. Instead
of needing to write Die Spezialität vom
Haus (vom is a contraction of von dem ) for “the
specialty of the house,” you can instead write:

Die Spezialität des Hauses

so the des means literally “of the.”

Genitive adds a suffix – s or – es to masculine and

neuter nouns, but not to feminine nouns.

Masculine: Das Bellen des Hundes.

Feminine: Ein Bild der Welt.

Neuter: Magst du den Geschmack des Bieres

Bieres?

5. The most common 30 prepositions can

be defined by these four groups.

(1) Dual Prepositions

Dual prepositions, which all describe location, are

usually the first set that are taught in German
classrooms. They include: an, auf, hinter, in,
neben, über, unter, vor and zwischen .

If the subject of the sentence is not moving, then

the nouns that these prepositions form
prepositional phrases with are in the dative case
case.

Dein Glas steht auf dem Tisch in der Küche.

Hinter meinem Haus wachsen viele

Kastanienbäume.
Das Mädchen hatte über den Augen keine
Augenbrauen, nur Tätowierungen.

If the subject of the verb is moving

moving, then these
prepositions give their nouns the accusative
case
case.

Er rannte in das Zimmer hinein, ohne seine

Schuhe auszuziehen.

Er lag sein Handy auf den Tisch.

Wir segelten über das Mittelmeer in nur einer

Woche.

(2) Dative Prepositions

The next set of prepositions are always in the

dative: ab, aus, bei, mit, nach, seit, von,
zu, and gegenüber.

Bei ihr gibt’s immer leckere Kuchen.

Von mir aus

aus, können wir gerne eine Reise nach
Spanien planen.

Wir werden Probleme mit deinem Chef kriegen,

wenn wir in September weggehen.

Be careful to note that gegenüber is used a little

differently; it comes after the noun that it refers to:

Dem Platz gegenüber gab es eine kleine Gruppe

von Breakdancern.

(3) Accusative Prepositions

The accusative prepositions are: bis, durch, für,

gegen, ohne, um and entlang.

Ohne dich wäre das Projekt kein Erfolg gewesen.

Ich wurde durch seine Argumente überzeugt.

(4) Genitive prepositions

Finally, the fanciest prepositions of all – the genitive

prepositions. Please note, all of the previous lists of
prepositions were exhaustive, but the list of
genitive prepositions is a bit long, so I’ve just
gathered a few of the most common ones:
außerhalb, innerhalb, jenseits, während,
trotz, and dank

Trotz seines
es schlechten Atemss hat er immer eine
hübsche Freundin gehabt.

Während seiner
er Zeit in Deutschland hat er immer
versucht, Deutsch zu sprechen.

Die Wienerische Vorstadt befindet sich außerhalb

der Ringstraße.

So, good luck! Once you master using all of these

prepositions with the correct case, you’ll be able to
start writing and speaking German with real fluency.
And when you get more experience recognizing
what case words are in, then you’ll be able to see
what relationship words in those long, knotty
German sentences have to each other.

Download: This blog post is available as a

convenient and portable PDF that you can take
anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

And One More Thing…

What’s the key to mastering German cases?

It’s using the right content and tools.

You’re not going to fully learn German grammar just

by studying what’s in your textbook.

That’s why you need to put it into practice with real-

world videos like music videos, commercials, news
and inspiring talks.

FluentU takes great videos and turns them into

language learning experiences so that you can
learn real German as people really speak it:
Watching a fun video, but having trouble
understanding it? FluentU brings native videos
within reach with interactive transcripts.

You can tap on any word to look it up

instantly. Every definition has examples that have
been written to help you understand how the word
is used. If you see an interesting word you don’t
know, you can add it to a vocab list.

And FluentU isn’t just for watching videos. It’s a

complete platform for learning. It’s designed to
effectively teach you all the vocabulary from any
video. Swipe left or right to see more examples of
the word you’re on.

The best part is that FluentU keeps track of the

vocabulary that you’re learning, and it recommends
you examples and videos based on the words
you’ve already learned. This is a level of
personalization that hasn’t been done
before.

Start using FluentU on the website with your

computer or tablet or, better yet, download the
FluentU app from the iTunes store.

If you liked this post, something tells me that you'll

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